ACROSS
1 Volkswagen
Type 1, familiarly
4 Yemeni neighbor
9 Old-timey oath
13 1956 Gregory
Peck role
15 Add a lane to,
say
16 University of New
Mexico athlete
17 Irish city in a
recession?
19 Watched warily
20 One with a stable
job?
21 Like dotted
musical notes
23 Cellphone
accessories
26 Body work,
briefly
27 Result of a
Czech checkup?
33 Catches some
rays
37 Home ec
alternative
38 Louisville’s KFC
Yum! Center,
e.g.
39 Dessert pancake
41 Part of USDA:
Abbr.
42 Spirited
diversions
43 Febreze targets
44 It’s on the house
46 Not as pricey
47 North African
dieter’s light fare?
50 Originally called
51 Jackhammer
sound
56 Malady
61 Thrill to pieces
62 Bibliog. catchall
63 South Korean
sailors?
66 Cartoon maker of
explosive tennis
balls
67 Pile up
68 Jib or mizzen
69 Where to store
hoes and hoses
70 Tense with
excitement
71 Genetic material
DOWN
1 Western movie
star?
2 Crewmate of
Chekov and Sulu
3 Eva or Zsa Zsa
4 Part of BYOB
5 Prefix with day
or night
6 Fusses
7 Small salamander
8 Present from birth
9 Like a political
“college”
10 Fiesta Baked
Beans maker
11 Collude with
12 Extinct bird
14 Gooey clump
18 “It’s not too late
to call”
22 Waterway with
locks
24 JAMA
subscribers
25 Much of Libya
28 “Diary of a
Madman” author
29 Hubbub
30 Bone-dry
31 26-Across
materials
32 Fresh talk
33 Craig Ferguson,
by birth
34 Pakistani
language
35 Eye-catching
sign
36 Rained gently
40 City on the
Ruhr
45 Cosmetics-
testing org.
48 Playground
piece
49 Originate (from)
52 Wistful word
53 Golden Horde
member
54 Ordered pizza,
perhaps
55 Car named for a
physicist
56 Wet septet
57 Scratching target
58 Attended the
party
59 Big Mack
60 Fly like an eagle
64 “It’s no __!”
65 “Dropped” ’60s
drug
By Dan Margolis
(c)2015 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
10/14/15
10/14/15
ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:
RELEASE DATE– Wednesday, October 14, 2015
Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle
Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis
xwordeditor@aol.com
Classifieds
Call: #734-418-4115
Email: dailydisplay@gmail.com
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HELP WANTED
Music’s hottest acts
cover Bleachers’
debut album
By CHRISTIAN KENNEDY
Daily Arts Writer
Bleachers’ Terrible Thrills, Vol.
2 is a reimagining of the band’s
debut album consisting of the
same 11 songs,
written
by
frontman Jack
Antonoff, per-
formed by an
array of estab-
lished
singers
and
up-and-
comers. I had
the pleasure of
seeing Bleach-
ers live this past
summer: I concluded that though
their record is OK, but their live
performances are extraordinary.
However, Vol. 2 offers a fresh
perspective on their original LP,
Strange Desire.
The
album
maintains
the
strength of its predecessor, with
covers by Sara Bareilles, Char-
li XCX, Carly Rae Jepsen and
Tinashe. Bareilles’s rendition of
“Wild Heart” deviates from the
original with its heavy produc-
tion, but it contrasts with the still-
smooth delivery, and the lyrics
hold the track steady in a fashion
that wasn’t present in the original.
Conversely, Charli XCX’s growl-
ing delivery on “Rollercoaster”
matches the instrumental tones
point for point — it’s actually hard
to believe the track isn’t solely
hers. “Shadow” maintains its
uplifting aura, and with its slight
push towards bubblegum pop
and Carly Rae Jepsen on vocals,
the cover highlights Antonoff’s
lyricism. The lead single from
Strange Desire, “I Wanna Get
Better,” can’t exactly get better;
nonetheless, it can get different —
which is precisely why the genre
shift from Bleachers’ pop-rock to
Tinashe’s smooth R&B doesn’t
have listeners switching back to
the original. And while her slight
note changes offer the same range
as Antonoff’s screams, it’s just not
as much fun to sing along to.
The second act contains some of
the most memorable moments on
Strange Desire, and by way of the
up-and-comers, the recreations
only improve upon their predeces-
sors. “Wake Me” is the record’s
biggest surprise. On the original,
it’s a typical ‘lighter in the air’
track, but in the hands of Lucius,
a five-piece indie-pop band, the
track achieves the conversational
tone it was always meant for. The
band’s harmonization pushes the
track in a direction that Antonoff
can’t quite get to on his own. Con-
versely, Elle King could sing the
dictionary and it would be a mel-
ody so beautiful, nothing seems
to matter more than the music.
“Reckless Love” is a slow burn: you
sing along to it, but you don’t move
to it. The softness of her delivery
feels innocent, juxtaposed with
the fiery crescendo making this
love feel all the more reckless. For
the album’s plateau, Brooke Candy
and Rachel Antonoff team up for
an unrecognizable cover of “Take
Me Away.” The only consistency
with the original is the ephemeral
hook: “I know you’re sorry, I know
you’re sorry, I know you’re sorry.”
In the end, it’s a somewhat forget-
table cover of a somewhat forget-
table song.
And as for the third-act come-
back, the star-power is back. Sia
takes on the melancholic “Like a
River Runs.” Instead of resting
on the chill-inducing a capella
chorus, she creates a track that
delivers the same degree of emo-
tion, but sounds completely dis-
similar. Sia’s take is a gospel while
Antonoff’s is a rock show. MØ,
best known for her feature with
Major Lazer, breathes excitement
back into the project with “You’re
Still a Mystery.” Between a saxo-
phone solo, MØ’s tinge of auto-
tune and the song’s ’70s movie
feel, the track stands out on Vol.
2. Finally, Natalie Maines (of the
Dixie Chicks) offers an acoustic,
slightly country “Who I Want You
to Love” to close the album. While
the acoustic guitar and Maines’
echoed delivery pull listeners
in one direction, the lengthy
instrumental break paired with
Antonoff’s outro remind them
that this is still a Bleachers record.
From the outset, releasing an
album of covers can be a tricky
game. The covers can’t completely
overwhelm the original work, but
they also can’t underperform, or
else there’s no point in producing
them. This is exactly why Strange
Desire works so well for this artis-
tic experiment. Vol. 2 highlights
the strengths in Antonoff’s lyri-
cism by displaying them through
a different lens — one that isn’t
generally better or worse than the
original — just different.
‘Terrible Thrills’
remixed in ‘Vol. 2’
A-
Terrible
Thrills,
Vol. 2
Bleachers
RCA Records
RCA RECORDS
Not to be confused with the seating.
John Luther Adams
talks life and oeuvre
By DAYTON HARE
For the Daily
The history of American con-
temporary classical music over
that last half century has been
as multi-
faceted as
the
face
of Amer-
ica itself.
Stud-
ded with
styles and
populated
by various
“isms,”
American
contem-
porary
music is impossible to pin down
and classify.
This variety in style is matched
by the variety of composers, many
of which have wildly different back-
grounds.
Compos-
ers
of
today live
lives
as
rock musi-
cians, jazz
pianists,
electronic
perform-
ers
and
profes-
sionals
that have nothing to do with music.
Some composers are the children
of concert masters; others never
heard a Beethoven symphony until
college. Each artist has taken their
own unique road to becoming the
composer they are.
One of the most interesting
paths taken is perhaps the one
tread by composer John Luther
Adams — a path which has now led
him to the University, where he’ll
be giving a talk on Thursday at the
Michigan Theater as part of the
Penny Stamps Speaker Series.
Adams — who is not to be con-
fused with the equally famous but
stylistically dissimilar California
based composer John Adams —
was born in Mississippi. As a child,
his family moved from place to
place a great deal.
“It was almost like being a mili-
tary brat, you know, we moved
every few years, from the Deep
South to the suburbs of New York
City,” Adams said in an interview
with the Michigan Daily.
His first musical experiences
weren’t classical, but rather part
of the world of rock ‘n’ roll, where
he was the drummer for several
bands during his adolescence — as
part of the group, Pocket Fuzz, he
once opened for the Beach Boys.
But Adams’s artistic direc-
tion was changed dramatically
by an encounter with the music
of Edgard Varèse (whose name
the young Adams mispronounced
Var-EE-zee) instigated by the lin-
ear notes of Frank Zappa’s album
Freak Out!. Inspired by the avant-
garde Varèse, Adams listened to
more and more contemporary
classical music, and his and his
band-mates work became more
and more experimental.
A few years after being part of
the first graduating class of the
California Institute of the Arts,
Adams made one of the most
important decisions of his life — he
moved to Alaska.
“As a result [of moving so fre-
quently as a child], there was never
a place in which I felt I belonged,
never really a place I thought I was
at home,” Adams said.
In Alaska he worked as an
environmental
activist
and
lived for several decades, expe-
riences which strongly shaped
his future work.
“I went north as an idealistic,
romantic young man, running
away from my family, running
away from the suburbs and the cit-
ies, running away from academia,
running away from competitive
careerism — you know I thought
I was leaving everything behind,
that I was running away from the
world,” Adams said.
“But it turns out that I was run-
ning to my home, my real family —
the family I discovered and chose
in Alaska — and my life’s work.
And I can’t imagine what would
have become of me as a man or as
an artist had I not found Alaska. It
is home in the deepest sense, and it
always will be.”
From his experiences in Alaska,
Adams drew inspiration for much
of his compositions and ideas,
some of which he will be discuss-
ing in the Penny Stamps talk.
“My theme is music in the
Anthropocene,” Adams said of
the Penny Stamps address. “It’s a
reflection on the meaning of cre-
ative work, the meaning of art
and music in these troubled times,
when we live in a world on the
verge of melting.”
Drawing from his 2003 essay
“Global Warming and Art” and
more recent writings, Adams said
his talk is a “reflect[ion] on why I
continue to do what I do in the face
of potentially catastrophic envi-
ronmental change.”
Following the Penny Stamps
address, the University Sympho-
ny Orchestra and conductor Ken-
neth Kiesler will be performing
Adams’s work “Become Ocean”
in Hill Auditorium, for which
Adams was the recipient of the
2014 Pulitzer Prize for Music.
“‘Become Ocean’ is my larg-
est orchestral work to date, and I
think it’s the culmination of years
of work. I think the music has
been leading me to this piece for
decades,” said Adams.
Adams
wrote
the
piece
very quickly, while in Mexico.
Explaining its origins, he said
“The house that we live in in
Mexico is right on the water. If
you have a good throwing arm
you can stand on the deck and
throw a ball into the ocean.”
“When we’re down there we
sleep with the windows open,
and I like to think that what
happened was that the music of
the sea was finding its way deep
into my consciousness, into my
dreams, and I would just get up
in the morning and do my best to
write down what I heard in my
sleep,” said Adams.
Referencing the act of compos-
ing, Adams said “I don’t under-
stand how any of this works, and
that’s fine with me.”
Adams elaborated, “As a cre-
ative artist, I often feel that if I
think I know what I’m doing, then
I’m probably not doing my job. I
think it’s all about discovery and
asking new questions, and not
knowing exactly where you are or
what you’re doing.”
“The reason that music is wor-
thy of a lifetime of devotion is that
the music always knows more
than the composer. The music is
always leading me into new ter-
ritory, and my job is simply to pay
attention and to do my best to fol-
low it wherever it wants me to go.”
Composer
John Luther
Adams Penny
Stamps Speech
Thursday Oct.
15, 5:10 p.m.
Michigan Theater
Free
USO
Performance of
Become Ocean
Thursday Oct.
15, 8 p.m.
Hill Auditorium
Free
ALBUM REVIEW
EVENT PREVIEW
6A — Wednesday, October 14, 2015
Arts
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
only be described as a “flop.” This
was only two years after Miller’s
graduation from the University.
Miller
began
his
time
at
Michigan as a journalism major
and writer for The Michigan Daily,
before switching his major to study
English. Within the department,
he began his artistry under the
guidance of Kenneth Rowe. It was
this relationship that continued to
connect Miller to the University
throughout his life.
Through
his
studies
of
Greek classics and the works of
Norwegian
playwright
Henrik
Ibsen, Miller was drawn to themes
of middle-class life and human
weakness, which would inspire his
work and the other most important
plays of the 20th century.
“He knew that if it wasn’t
successful, he wouldn’t remain a
dramatist. As he himself has put
it, ‘there were far more important
things to do in the world’ than write
plays,” director Goldberg said.
Goldberg, who also graduated
from the University in 1995 as
a
Theater
and
Comparative
Literature major, understands
the deep relevance of the play
today. She has high hopes for its
audience.
“This play will always have
resonance because war is a big
business and we, as a nation, seem
to always be in that business. In
addition, the central themes of
honor and duty in a family will be
issues families throughout history
will grapple with,” Goldberg said.
“My hope artistically is to expose
the depth of this story and remind
audiences of the timeless nature
of this work.”
Much of this timeless nature
can be attributed to Miller’s ability
to resonate with a broad audience.
Goldberg uses the example of
gender to discuss this, rejecting the
idea that Miller writes “guy plays.”
Her personal and most poignant
connection to the play is with the
wife and mother, Kaye Keller.
“There is language about all
that Kate has kept of her lost son
Larry’s; she has preserved his
room and his things, and our
production exposes what is up
in that bedroom we never see on
stage. For me, it is to shed light on
all the pain mothers in particular
have to endure with this sort of
loss,” Goldberg said. “Kate Keller
is given the last lines of this play —
like a great Shakespeare play, the
final speaker is assumed to be the
one who will be the successor, and
indeed in this domestic world, it
remains true.”
The
excitement
and
commitment of those behind the
production merits attention as
well. Goldberg and the cast of 10
students (some acting parts many
years their senior) will bring to
life these nuanced perspectives,
freshening
the
play
and
maximizing its emotional power.
“My other large job in this
production is to modulate the
emotional intensity and help the
actors choreograph their internal
and external life,” Goldberg said.
Each character is critical in their
own way, and the team has spent a
great deal of time developing each
individual story.
“To direct Miller in the only
theater in the world named after
Miller, at a place that has shared
this meaning for both of us, is
a gift I will always cherish,”
Goldberg said.
As a treasure of American
artistry
and
an
accessible
exploration
of
social
responsibility, war and loss, “All
My Sons” fulfills its important
artistic
function,
transcends
generational gaps and earns its
handle as “timeless.”
MILLER’S ‘SONS’
From Page 1A